


The Bird Strike

by Glowbug



Category: Cabin Pressure
Genre: Gen, Missing Scene, St. Petersburg
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-10
Updated: 2014-02-12
Packaged: 2018-01-11 20:40:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,939
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1177679
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Glowbug/pseuds/Glowbug
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>I started imagining how Carolyn and Arthur might have reacted to the bird strike in the St. Petersburg episode (seeing as they were stuck back in the cabin not really in a position to do anything!) and came up with this.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Carolyn

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "It turns out a really good cure for being drunk is when you’re on a plane and then an engine explodes and you think you’re gonna die."  
> \- Arthur Shappey (Cabin Pressure: St. Petersburg)

Arthur has had, at most, one mouthful of vodka. Carolyn reminds herself of this for the tenth time as she switches off the intercom. He cannot _possibly_ be as drunk as his behavior seems to indicate. At present, however, he is engaging in deadly warfare with the zipper of his flight bag.

“Mum, there’sh shtill half a Toblerone in here and the zipper’sh shtuck!”

“Arthur,” Carolyn says tiredly, “may I suggest that I liberate the Toblerone and you sit down and be quiet?”

“Yesth,” Arthur slurs. He hands over the flight bag, plops down into the nearest window seat, and happily presses his nose to the glass. Carolyn has to tap him on the shoulder to hand him his chocolate. “Oh! Thanksh, Mum!” He rips the foil and, with intense concentration, breaks off a ridge. “Want shome?”

She is taking the proffered triangle when the plane jolts horribly. Her first impulse is to switch the intercom back on and give Martin a piece of her mind, but then she hears the explosion outside the window. The ridge of chocolate flies from her hand and rattles to the floor three rows away. Arthur nearly slides into the seat in front of him, but miraculously maintains his grasp on the remainder of his Toblerone.

She regains her footing at about the same time Arthur manages to look out the window again. “Mum! _Mum!_ The engine’s on fire!” Carolyn curses, stumbling to the window. She presses her face beside his.

Flames lick out from under the wing.

Arthur shoves the Toblerone in his pocket and starts to stand up. Carolyn grabs his shoulder. “What on earth do you think you’re doing?”

“I’m going to help Shkip and Douglash!”

 _“No,_ Arthur!” She pushes him back into his seat. “Listen closely. Martin and Douglas know exactly what has just happened and will handle it in… whatever way they handle it.” _Which had best involve Douglas taking control of the aeroplane._ “The last thing either of our pilots needs right now is a distraction, which means neither you nor I will be entering the flight deck or so much as _touching_ the intercom until we are safely back on the ground. Do you understand?”

Arthur takes a deep breath. “Don’t go in the flight deck, don’t touch the intercom, don’t talk to Skip and Douglas. Right. Can’t we do anything at all, Mum?”

Carolyn looks away from Arthur’s plaintive expression and gazes out the window again. To her relief, the flames have subsided and it feels as if GERTI is turning around, back toward the runway. Her pilots have managed to recall some semblance of emergency procedure, then. “I’m afraid at the moment all we can do is fasten our seat belts and perhaps say a few prayers.”

“Oh.” They click their seat belts. Arthur looks thoughtful for a moment. “Now I lay me down to sleep —”

“Not that sort of prayer!”

“Sorry.” Silence. Then: “Mum? Are we going to die?”

The plane shakes in a sudden gust of wind. Carolyn swallows hard. “I… don’t know, Arthur. I sincerely hope not. Douglas is likely bringing us in for an emergency landing at this very moment, so it’s all down to that.”

“So if he lands us okay, we won’t die.”

“No.”

“But… if he doesn’t…”

Carolyn notes, with something approaching amusement, that Arthur has ceased to act drunk now that he’s distracted by the imminent crisis. Funny, how _this_ is what she notices. “Possibly, Arthur, yes.”

Arthur looks out the window, then back at her, and he smiles. “Well, then.” He reaches over and takes her hand, just as he did when he was five and didn’t quite understand how to cross the street. “I love you, Mum.”

“And I you,” she replies quietly, squeezing his hand. Her boy may lack brains, but she sometimes forgets how often he makes up the deficiency with heart.

Not another word passes between them as GERTI continues to jostle through the air, though they lean toward the window simultaneously as it nears the ground. The longest moment of a landing is always the moment just before the plane touches the ground, and today that moment stretches for eternity.

Finally, with a _thump_ only moderately harder than usual, GERTI touches down. Carolyn and Arthur breathe sighs of relief and relax their vigil on the window. Arthur is smiling. “We didn’t die, Mum!”

“No, we didn’t.” She returns the smile.

 _Bing-bong!_ Douglas’s voice crackles slightly over the cabin address, but his pride and relief are audible. “Carolyn and Arthur, this is your Douglas speaking, letting you know that we have safely returned to St. Petersburg courtesy of Captain Martin Crieff and his _textbook_ emergency landing.”

 _“Martin?!”_ Carolyn squeaks. _“Martin_ landed the plane?”

“Wow!” Arthur says. “He was _brilliant!_ ”

For once, she can hardly disagree. She makes her way to the intercom as quickly as she dares in the still-moving plane (now blissfully on the ground instead of in the air). “Douglas! Are you two all right? What on earth happened?”

“Ohhhhhh godddddd…” Martin says faintly in the background, but it is Douglas who answers her.

“Bird strike, we think, but we’ll need a mechanic to be sure. We’re fine, aside from the fact that Martin is gripping the control column so tightly his knuckles are white.”

“He really landed the plane?” Carolyn asks.

“Indeed he did. And radioed in our mayday call, too. We’ll have to put an extra row of braid on his hat.” Oh, thank God. Douglas is making sarcastic quips. Everything _must_ be all right.

“D-D-Douglas,” Martin interrupts. “C-c-could you help w-with the…?”

“Arthur and I will stay put,” Carolyn informs her pilots. “We can talk when we’re stopped and off the plane.”

“Roger.” Douglas shuts the intercom off.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was Carolyn. Next chapter is Arthur. :)


	2. Arthur

Ten minutes later, Arthur is the first one off the plane. “I could just about kiss the ground right now, Mum!”

_“Don’t,”_ his mother responds immediately.

“Not really. It’s one of those fancy figures of speech,” he assures her, grinning proudly. “It’s fun to think about, though.”

“For once in my life I find myself agreeing with Arthur,” Douglas remarks from behind him.

Arthur turns around and waves, even though Douglas and Martin are only about ten feet away. “Hello, Douglas! Hello — Skip?”

Before he can find the proper words to ask about Martin’s shaking legs and ghastly white face, Carolyn finds them for him. “Good heavens, Martin! Are you all right?”

“I — I — “ Martin stammers.

“I really don’t think he is, Mum,” Arthur says. “He’s standing all wobbly and he’s gone an awfully funny color and — “

Martin’s knees buckle. Douglas grabs him by the arm as he staggers, gasping. “Steady, Martin. Deep breath.” Martin obeys, shuddering. To Carolyn, Douglas adds, “He’ll be all right. He’s just shaken up. Perfectly normal. I didn’t even fare this well after my first emergency landing.”

“You did an emergency landing before, Douglas?” Arthur asks.

The first officer regards him. “It was about fifteen years ago and I may or may not have fainted afterwards.” Arthur glances at his mum and catches a ghost of a smile on her face. He knows this is the kind of thing she and Martin would tease Douglas about, on any day but today. It _is_ kind of funny to think that Douglas was ever flustered enough to faint. But at the moment, Arthur’s not quite sure that Martin _won’t._

“Naturally, you will not repeat this to anyone,” Douglas continues. Even Martin smiles weakly at that.

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Carolyn says dryly. “We do however have other things to worry about. Arthur, take Martin inside before he collapses. Get him a chair and something to drink. Douglas and I will come find you after we’ve sorted… _this_ out.” She gestures vaguely towards the aeroplane.

“Righto, Mum!” Arthur trots over to Martin and takes his free arm. “You can hang onto me, Skip. I’m strong.” Douglas releases Martin, nods to Arthur, and walks over to Carolyn. “Come on, Skip,” Arthur says. “Nice warm inside-of-the-airport. Let’s go.”

* * *

 

Arthur would like to take Martin to the observation deck he found when they first arrived in St. Petersburg. It has nice soothing music and big overstuffed armchairs, both of which Martin seems to need very badly. That room is up a flight of stairs on the other side of the airport, though. Martin still wobbles with every step, so maybe that’s not such a brilliant idea.

Instead, Arthur finds an empty gate — no planes, no passengers — and sits Martin in one of the ordinary airport waiting-chairs. “There you are, Skip. You just wait right here. I’ll go get you some coffee. Want me to put sugar in it? I think somebody told me once that sugar’s really good for people who’ve had a shock, unless they’re actually hurt because that’s some other kind of shock and you’re not supposed to feed them anything, which doesn’t really make sense, for some shocks to need sugar and others not, but I guess it doesn’t matter because you’re _not_ hurt, you’re just all wobbly — oh! I know!” He digs into his pocket and produces a three-inch triangular wedge wrapped in tinfoil. “You can have the rest of my Toblerone, Skip! That’s sugary! I can put sugar in your coffee too, though.”

And Martin chuckles. Just a little. But it’s a real chuckle, and he reaches up to take the Toblerone. Arthur beams. “N-not too much sugar,” Martin tells him. “Just — regular amount is fine. Th-thanks.”

“I’ll be right back!” Arthur looks up at the gate number, pulls a magic marker out of his pocket, and writes it down on his hand. He always does this, ever since the time he forgot where the plane was and his mother had to have the airport page him. Once he knows the right gate, Arthur is good at navigating airports. He’s had lots of practice.

He has to walk all the way over to the next concourse to find a coffee shop that isn’t so crowded he can’t get to the counter. (He tried to calculate how long he’d be waiting in line at the second place he passed, but it was too much maths, so he gave it up.) Unfortunately, the lady at the counter seems to only speak Russian, and no matter how many times Arthur says “one cup of coffee, please,” he doesn’t know how to say it except in English. The drink she ultimately gives him looks like coffee, but doesn’t smell quite right. Maybe it’s a special Russian coffee. Arthur stirs in milk and three sugars (and slips two extra in his pocket, just in case) and hopes for the best. He’s been gone half an hour — he needs to get back and check on Skip. He can always try one of the crowded coffee shops again later.

Getting back goes a bit quicker after he finds one of those brilliant moving sidewalks, except for the businessman with the rolling suitcase who almost runs into him and gets all grouchy about it. Martin is sitting where Arthur left him. His face has returned to its usual color (phew), but Arthur’s mum and Douglas are nowhere to be seen. Oh well. Between the two of them, his mum and Douglas can sort out just about anything. Besides the really important thing is they’re all still alive. Still being alive is _brilliant._

Maybe later, if it takes a while to fix GERTI, there will even be time to check the duty-free shop for black Toblerones.

He trots over to Martin, cup in hand.

“Here you are, Skip. Nice hot cup of coffee.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, I thought Arthur's chapter would be shorter than Carolyn's, but when I started typing it up it grew!
> 
> I take full responsibility for the inevitable inaccuracies that come from writing about an airport in St. Petersburg using the mental image of one in Minneapolis. :)
> 
> Thanks for reading!


End file.
